1 Peter 2.9, 10
You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
A. Are you one of God’s people?
John 1.12:
Jesus came to his own nation, but they did not accept Him. But to all who believed and accepted Him, He gave the right to become children of God.
John calls out joyfully John 1.13:
They are reborn! This is not a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan. This rebirth comes from God (NLT)
Becoming part of God’s people was, and still is, only possible by being born again.
1 Peter 1.23: You have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring Word of God.
When you accept the Word of God about Jesus, the Word becomes like seed in your heart, and by the Holy Spirit, God creates a new person in you.
That is a dramatic event. Peter says of it we have been called out of darkness into his wonderful light. (1 Peter 2.9)
B. Some thoughts about God’s people
1. Peter is writing to people who know all about suffering.
1 Peter 1.1 identifies them as strangers in the world, scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bythinia that is, throughout the known world at the time. The people of the so-called Diaspora.
Persecuted by their own people, the Jews, as well as gentiles; driven out of Rome. Some of their group were even killed, martyred for their faith in Jesus.
2. Becoming part of God’s people was/is not cheap
2.1 The whole Godhead, the Trinity Father, Son and Holy Spirit is involved.
1 Peter 1.2 says people of God are
Chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus Christ and sprinkling by his blood.
2.2 1 Peter 1.19 says we have been …redeemed with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.
We are a holy people, because we belong to God, who bought us with the blood of Jesus. Jesus paid the price for us to be forgiven, and to be be put in the right relationship with God.
3. God’s people are his place of residence in this world.
1 Peter 2.5:
You are being built into a house of God
Paul explains it as follows:
Colossians 1.27:
The secret of the Gospel is that Christ lives in you, and this is your assurance that you will share in his glory.
Each one of us is a place of residence for God, and together we form the corporate Body of Christ.
4. We are a royal priesthood (1 Peter 2.9)
In the Old Testament people could not approach God directly, only through priests who were privileged to have access to God.
Now we have direct access to God.
As priests in God’s Kingdom we are also called and able to minister to others who do not know Him yet.
5. The purpose of God with his people is that they may proclaim Him to others.
1 Peter 2.9:
… that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.
“Declare” is not only what preachers and evangelists do.
Psalm 19.1: The heavens declare the glory of God.
Philippians 2.15, 16:
If we hold tightly to the word of life, then, among a warped and crooked generation, we will shine like stars in the sky.
C. We are a strange people indeed.
1 Peter 2.11:
aliens and strangers in the world.
David Bosch describes the ambivalence of the church in striking terms.
“The church has, since her birth, been a peculiarly ambivalent body. She is in but not of the world. She always moves ‘between salvation history and history’. She is a sociological entity like any other human organisation and as such susceptible to all human frailties; at the same time she is an eschatological entity and as such the incorruptible Body of Christ. Seen through the eyes of the world she is usually under suspicion, disreputable and shabby; in the light of eternity she is a mystery. The resurrected Christ breathed his Spirit into a very earthy and common group of people. Thus the church became an inseparable union of the divine and the mundane. Sometimes one aspect is more in evidence, sometimes the other. We can be utterly disgusted at times with the earthiness of the church; at other times we are enraptured by the awareness of the divine dimension in the church. Usually, however, it is the ambivalence that strikes us: the church as a community of people – good people, weak people, hesitant people, courageous people – on their way through the world, dust-stained but somehow strangely illuminated by a radiancy from elsewhere” (Bosch, 1980, 93).
Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, not on our own good or bad qualities, or skills. He is the author and finisher of our faith, that is the One on whom our faith depends from start to finish. (Hebrews 12.2)
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